Apple to Samsung in Australia: No Deal

Apple isn’t interested in Samsung’s deal offer in their ongoing patent legal battle in Australia. Samsung had hoped Apple would accept its proposal to remove some features from its Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet so it could bring the product to market in the country.

Apple on Samsung deal proposal: Meh

Without the prospect of a quick settlement, Samsung’s legal team said the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Australia is “commercially dead,” according to Reuters.

“If we can’t get a decision out by mid-October, there is no urgency,” said Samsung attorney Neil Young.

Apple and Samsung have been locked in a legal battle over patent infringement claims for several months. Both companies have alleged that the other’s mobile devices use patented technologies without proper licensing, and have filed lawsuits against each other in the U.S. and other countries.

A German court recently upheld an injunction blocking the sale of Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet in the country. Samsung has filed an appeal in hopes of overturning that ruling. Apple was also awarded a temporary injunction through a Dutch court blocking the sale of some Galaxy devices in the European Union.

Samsung previously agreed to keep its Galaxy Tab 10.1 out of Australia until the beginning of October while a judge reviewed the case, and now potentially faces a court-ordered ban on the tablet thanks to a request from Apple for an injunction.

Apple’s legal team looks ready to take the patent fight to trial, regardless of any Samsung deal offers and keep the Galaxy Tab 10.1 off store shelves in Australia. “The main reason we are here is to prevent the launch and maintain the status quo,” said Apple lawyer Steven Burley.

Dear Bosco: Let me help you out here. By preserve the status quo, Apple’s lawyer means that to prevent Apple suffering irreparable harm until the court’s final decision by imposing an injunction. It is a requirement of injunctive relief, as it is for most equitable remedies, that damages will not be adequate to compensate the movant/plaintiff for the harm done by the non-movant/defendant’s proposed conduct. Therefore, a primary purpose of injunctive relief is to preserve the status quo ante, until the court can decide the matter.

So what my Brother Burley was saying, for the uninitiated, like you, is that Apple is moving the court to enjoin Samsung from selling its Galaxy Tab and, thus, preserve the status quo ante, because after Samsung’s sale of the Galaxy Tab, damages won’t be an adequate remedy.

Lawyers are hilarious. They convince themselves that they are guardians of great principles when they are but pawns for self-interest. Nothing wrong with the latter, BTW, if you’re honest about it like Burley.

Bosco: No lawyer that I know of is under any illusion that isn’t his client’s fiduciary agent. And as an agent a lawyer carries out his client’s will. However, there are limits to what a lawyer may do in carrying out a client’s will. In serving his client, no lawyer may do anything that violates his ethical code of conduct, either the Model Rules of Professional Conduct or the Model Code of Professional Conduct. All lawyers are also officers of the court and must, therefore, respect the court’s rules, its orders and rulings, and respect and assist the court’s institutional responsibility to administer and preserve justice. Also, all lawyer, in their oath of office, swear to protect and defend the United States Constitution and swear loyalty to the United States.

It is that ethical code of conduct the ennobles the profession of the law, even where the client or the client’s ends are less than noble.

It says
“Samsung had offered to agree to a quick trial on Apple?s patent claim if Apple agreed to drop its demand for a ban on the sale of the Galaxy 10.1, Young said. Apple rejected the proposal, he said.”